Lower Kitchener (534 Charles St E) | 32, 27, 15 fl | Proposed

[panamaniac]

This building will be 30 floors rather than 32, 27 of which can be occupied for a total of 92 meters in height. There will be a total of 486 one and two bedroom rental units, 5 live-work units (located on the ground floor facing Charles Street), 3 commercial units (located on the ground floor facing King Street), 290 parking spaces (primarily contained in the podium with the exception of a small surface parking lot for the commercial units), an amenity space on top of the podium which has a little parkette/reflecting pond/swimming pool.

The art deco tower that was part of the Onward Manufacturing building will not be fully retained as is, but rather modified to a contemporary style (including imagery of the art deco tower visible on the glass) and aligned directly with Onward Avenue. The podium will also have a historical map representation of Waterloo Region dating to the 1930s to reflect the historical heritage of the old factory. There are also plans for a set of 27 and 15 floor towers (nearest King Street and Charles Street respectively) located beside the 30 floor tower.

The architectural design is by the local firm Neo Architecture who have worked on the majority of Vive projects.

Huge downgrade with the loss of that Art Deco feature

Very sad.  I hope that there will be pushback.

[ac3r]

Doubtful, I don't think most people care much about the old architectural features and it's really up to Vive and Neo. It might be worth contacting them (ideally the developer) to suggest it. It would indeed be nice if they saved the original tower. You could easily integrate the art deco aspect into the contemporary design of the new building...the hardest part might be to match the colour of the old concrete to the rest of the project which, if I had to speculate, is why they're deciding to redo it.

[Spokes]

Feels very bland

[Acitta]

A 30-storey apartment building on King Street East is rental housing ‘targeted at middle market,’ says Kitchener developer

Proposed development will be located on nine properties along King and Charles streets, including the former Onward Manufacturing company.

[Acitta]

Can four highrises turn a Kitchener neighbourhood into an ‘urban village?’

KITCHENER — Civic planners aim to transform a faded stretch of King Street East into a “walkable urban village.”
But urban village is not a technical planning term. Developers have made no reference to it in proposing to build four highrise towers between 23 and 30 storeys in the central neighbourhood that includes the intersection of King and Ottawa streets.


Also mentioned in this story, 1668 King St. E. and 20 Ottawa St. N.

[panamaniac]

Weird article - it seems clear that the vision of 2008 is not that of developers in 2022. I suppose the City can try to push back and create a “village” of lower buildings, but it seems to me that the train has already left the station.

[the_conestoga_guy]

Can four highrises turn a Kitchener neighbourhood into an ‘urban village?’

KITCHENER — Civic planners aim to transform a faded stretch of King Street East into a “walkable urban village.”
But urban village is not a technical planning term. Developers have made no reference to it in proposing to build four highrise towers between 23 and 30 storeys in the central neighbourhood that includes the intersection of King and Ottawa streets.


Also mentioned in this story, 1668 King St. E. and 20 Ottawa St. N.

I generally think that we need to build as much housing as possible - which these projects achieve - but I do wholeheartedly agree with this quote from the article:

One challenge is that piecemeal development may undermine unity of design in a broader neighbourhood.

“Instead of the municipality establishing clear guidelines and sticking to those guidelines, development is happening on an amendment-by-amendment basis,” she said.

I personally feel this exact same frustration with the Victoria/Park tower project. It's a gorgeous design that absolutely should be built for many reasons, but it's frustrating not knowing what the Region's plan is for the reconfiguration of Victoria, or what the city is planning for the development of the rest of the Bramm Yards. Should we be expecting another ION in the future? Bike lanes or a multi-use trail? The new towers will look out of place on day 1, but how will they look in 10 years? Should we be expecting the whole area to be redeveloped including more towers? Is the city planning on reserving some space for a park?

Similarly, I've previously vented my frustration on this site for the lack of system-wide planning going into the Duke Street bike lane. Duke needs to have bike infrastructure, but the city's own planning documents outright reject some road configurations because it would restrict bus access. However, the city's tool isn't capable of comparing other scenarios, like moving bus routes onto the adjacent King St? This just feels like lazy planning.

To me, it feels like the city lacks the courage to actually have a holistic vision for these areas. This, in turn, gives NIMBYs mountains of ammunition for fighting these housing projects. I can't fault them, since the city has never given a clear indication of its vision - if it even has one. The best we have is the PARTS plans, but even those only give vague interpretations. King/Ottawa is just dripping with potential, but I have no idea what the actual plans are for this area in the future.

I guess I don't have a final point to make here, I just wanted to vent about how poor my impressions are of the planning departments in the Region and City.

[nms]

I think the general challenge with holistic urban planning is that it can be very difficult to do when you have so many different interested parties ranging from upper levels of government who have their own planning priorities, local governments who have their own priorities, local interest groups (ie transportation or heritage advocates), and then individual property owners (ranging from large landowners to single houses).  I know that the Region and the Cities have been working hard to come up with unified strategies over what seems like forever.  Unfortunately, it also feels like as soon as they get close, something changes beyond their control and things have to start over.

Unless you have a blank slate urban area (say London, UK after the Great Fire of 1666; or much of Germany after World War II) or someone like Emperor Napoleon III who decides the completely redevelop downtown Paris, it is always going to be a piecemeal approach.  Even large projects take a long time.  Redeveloping Paris took 17 years (1853-1870) and much of the post-war rebuilding of Europe took almost as long, if not longer.


Add to that, many grand visions are launched, a few buildings are built according to plan, and then priorities change and that vision dies.  I read a great book a few years ago that identified orphans of nearly a dozen 'grand plans' in Toronto.

I think is also difficult to consider that when a large suburb is developed, it is often under the control of one developer.  Even should the City or Region have their own thoughts, the overall development has a somewhat unified look because it was likely a very small design group that came up with the vision.  Forty or fifty years later, new landowners arrive and have the opportunity to change their small corner of the suburb without being able to necessarily influence other developments in same area.  

Perhaps the closest area in the Region where there was an opportunity for a wholesale neighbourhood reimagining that was largely driven by heterogenous private interest was the Northdale neighbourhood, for better or for worse.

[ZEBuilder]

Vive has recently submitted new plans for this development, the size of the building has remained the same but the layout of the site is now entirely different. In the original plan the 30 floor building was on the Borden side of the property but in the new plan the 30 floor building is now on the Charles St side of the property, they have also added a 13 floor building connected to the 30 floor building that goes from King to Charles where the original tower was so on floors 7-13 it is a L shaped building before it transitions to the tower. 

For those interested here is the links to the Site plan/Elevations/Floor plans: https://app2.kitchener.ca/AppDocs/OpenDa...awings.pdf

and the Renders: https://app2.kitchener.ca/AppDocs/OpenDa...erings.pdf

[ZEBuilder]

The model of the new building, the first is from King/Borden, the second is from Charles/Borden,
     

[ZEBuilder]

Renders,

King and Onward
   

Charles and Borden
   

King and Borden
   

There are more renders in the documents at night and from a few other angles.

[SF22]

A bunch of updated documents went up on the Kitchener Planning Applications site in late November. Looks like they might be calling this building "Eureka!! @ Lower Kitchener" (notably with 2 exclamation marks) as per the updated Urban Design Brief.

I kind of like the big Art Deco arches they've added on the side of the parking garage area, and particularly that the art installation will be facing Ottawa St to help build that 'gateway to DTK' feeling from the south side.

Also appreciate that they have a decent number of 2 bedroom + den units in this one, and that they've already earmarked a decent amount of park space at the Borden/King corner. There's really no nearby existing parks to this location (maybe Knollwood at Sheppard is the closest), so I'm certain it'll be appreciated by the surrounding neighbourhood as well.

[panamaniac]

Those renders make the King St-facing facade of the taller tower look pretty bleak.

[urbd]

the tower portion looks like a prison from a dystopian movie

[ac3r]

Yuck. This region really goes out of their way to have the ugliest buildings possible.